DizzyNails

 This is two coats of Sephora X Perplexed.

 It's a metallic steel color with gold shimmer - or should I say small gold glitters?  Large shimmer...small glitter.  Something like that.

 The gold - whatever it is - has a lovely twinkle to it.  Very magical in person!

 My pictures don't really do this polish justice.

 This is three coats of Lippmann Sugar Shack.  I recently got the three piece holiday set at Bloomingdales.  They had plenty of them, still!

 Call me a sucker for shimmery, duochromey, glass flecked polishes.  The formula is always tricky for me - but I think I've finally mastered it.  I just have to go very slow and wait in between coats.  This prevents bubbles for me, which I find particularly troublesome with this type of finish.

 I really love the blue shimmer!  I used Sephora X base and top coats here, which gave me a good three days of wear (better than what I normally get with Lippmanns).

 My swell husband helped me to get the new Lynnderella Holiday collection.  Isn't he great?!  This is my first mani using one of those fine, fine polishes.  I chose The Present is a Gift for my first one.  :)

 The tall and skinny StrangeBeautifuls need to be used with care, I find, or else you can easily knock them over whilst painting your nails!

 Okay, back to pretty, fancy, glittah pictures!  These glitters are just magical.

 I used one coat of The Present is a Gift, doing a combination of painting and then dabbing movements.  The glitters gave me no trouble at all during application.

 I smoothed it out and finished with a coat of Gelous, a coat of Sephora X top coat, and finally a coat of Seche Vite.  My favorite spot on this mani is where the two black diamonds almost meet on my ring finger.  :)

 I've had this on for four days now, and oddly, it seems like longer.  This is four thin coats of OPI The World is Not Enough.

 I used Sephora X base coat under it and Sephora X top coat over top.  For whatever reason, the X base and top combined with OPI has been giving me better than normal wear!  Hooray!

 It's still not as good as my nine days with X polish...but four or five days with OPI is novel and fun for me!

 I tried to wear this one earlier and had some icky bubbling, likely because I went too fast.  I say "too fast," but really it was as fast as I normally go (not waiting between coats or anything).  This type of polish, I find, really needs some patience and babying.  What should I even call this finish?  Metallic shimmer?!  It's freaking gorgeous, whatever it is.

 So, yeah, just GO SLOW, and it will all be okay and be totally worth it.  I waited between my coats, I made sure to do thinner coats than normal (thus the need for four coats), and presto-magic-o, my mani was near perfect!

 Also, just so you know, this is way prettier in person than in pictures.  It's super shiny and metallic looking.  In some lights it appears a bit purple to me, which I really enjoy.

 How on earth has it been 10 days since my last post?!

 I blame illness, retail work, and the Holidays.

 This here is three coats of OPI Speak for Your-Elf, a mini from the Ulta Holiday set from - I want to say - last year.  I did another Sephora X experiment by using their base and top coat with this mani.

 Results?  HUGE success!  I'm on day seven currently, with only tip wear!  This is so cool.

 Ah, this was my previous mani, which I didn't really get any proper pictures of.  I used NerdLacquer Don't Panic (green) and Data Squirrel (red).  It was my glittery funky Christmas themed mani.

 This is my second go at a Sephora X nail polish mani.  I used two coats of Ice Princess here.

 Ice Princess is a mix of highly reflective and metallic goldy-green shimmers as well as larger chunky pink glitters.  It's a bit thick, so application does require a little extra care.  I didn't feel the need particularly to clean up, though, so that's an added bonus.

 It's quite textured, as I'm sure you can see.  I used three coats of Sephora X top coat (denying Gelous so as to be a Sephora X purist and hope for nine days of amazing wear) and it still was not smooth.  I can't do more than three top coats.  I just.  Can't.

 Check out how insanely metallic and mirror-like it can be!  And also how chunk-tastic, below!  I kind of loved and hated it, all at the same time.  The shininess kept winning me back, though.

 My pictures don't capture it, but the gold shimmer actually shifts green in person.  It's really quite interesting and unique.  You can almost see it below.

 As much as I would have been happy to have worn this for nine days, it was not meant to be.  :(  It started chipping - fairly big chips - in about a day's time.  I tend to have quicker and bigger chipping with glitter polishes in general, so I'm not totally shocked.  I was definitely sad, though.

 I was so excited about how well the Sephora X mani wore on me that I decided to do an experiment using just Sephora X base coat and top coat with another polish brand.  I chose Zoya.

 This is three coats of Ivanka.  I used one coat of Sephora X base underneath and one coat of Sephora X top coat over top.

 Ivanka is so unbelievably sparkly and dimensional in person and I'm sad I didn't get pictures of her in the sun.  Application was easy.

 Here is an update on the Sephora X mani for you.  I took these pictures on day EIGHT.  I ended up taking off Deranged on day NINE.

 I'm more than blown away by the wear time here.  In fact, to be honest, the last day or two I actually got very reckless with my nails and was picking at things (mostly my poor cuticles) like a naughty girl - I was taunting it to chip yet it would not!!  That weird spot on the end of my pinky nail?  It's like tip wear on steroids.  I wish I knew why but that spot always wears that way, no matter what mani.  :(

 You can see the tip wear all too well in these pictures, mostly because I'm angling to show it off.  In person, it was hardly noticeable.  I did have a tiny chip on the corner of my right index finger (see awkward picture below) that occurred on the first or second day.  Pardon my scraggly skin on that finger.  It gets beat up and picked on more than others!  I thought for sure that the lil' chip would worsen but it didn't go any further until day nine, at which point it went from tiny chip to small chip.

 I recently bought the new Sephora X base coat, top coat, and two polishes.  I was very anxious to try them as I've heard various things about the formula already.

 The X line is supposed to provide a gel-like shine and wear with very good opacity.  I immediately thought, "Well, I'll be the judge of that!"

 This mani is a coat of the X base, two very easy coats of Deranged, and a coat of the X top coat.  While Deranged looks a lot like Orly Galaxy Girl, I feel pretty confident saying that they are not dupes.  

Deranged has more of a pinky-red to blue flash that is very apparent and duo cool while Galaxy Girl has a more prominent turquoise flash.  There is also more of a purple feel to Deranged and more of a burgundy feel to Galaxy Girl.  I'm going to go out on a limb, not having compared them side to side, and say that Deranged is more complex and awesome.

 So, how's the wear, you ask?  It's pretty great so far!  I'm on the end of day four right now and I have a tiny chip on the corner of my right index finger.  I also have some tip wear, but it's not very apparent.  Overall, so far, I am impressed.  Also, the top coat dried reasonably quick.  I was terribly worried that my mani would take an eternity to dry without using quick dry top coat.  I painted these four layers without waiting (or hardly) in between, sprayed everything with quick dry spray, then waited about 25 minutes.  Then I got ready for my day!  They were dry enough to function easily.